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Edward Jenner
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Edward Jenner Edward Jenner
Gloved hands draw liquid from a vial into a syringe, overlaid on a digitally colored microscopic image of a virus with round particles in clusters.
Edward Jenner
The video thumbnail image shows a historical painting of George Washington and Revolutionary troops in the winter.
Edward Jenner inoculating his son with the smallpox vaccine, statue by Giulio Monteverde; in the Palazzo Bianco, Genoa, Italy. Smallpox vaccination
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Edward Jenner
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Artificial lung ventilation monitor in the intensive care unit. Nurse with medical equipment. Ventilation of the lungs with oxygen. COVID-19 and coronavirus identification. Pandemic.
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Edward Jenner
Edward Jenner Edward Jenner, detail of an oil painting by James Northcote, 1803; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Edward Jenner

English surgeon
Written by
Lester S. King
Former Professorial Lecturer in the History of Medicine, University of Chicago. Author of The Growth of Medical Thought.
Lester S. King
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Britannica Editors
Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....
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•History

Edward Jenner (born May 17, 1749, Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England—died January 26, 1823, Berkeley) was an English surgeon and discoverer of a vaccine for smallpox. Jenner was born at a time when the patterns of British medical practice and education were undergoing gradual change. Slowly the division between the Oxford- or Cambridge-trained physicians and the apothecaries or surgeons—who were much less educated and who acquired their medical knowledge through apprenticeship rather than through academic work—was becoming...

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